Giants vs. Redskins is a classic rivalry, one of the oldest and most cherished in the NFL, and undeniably a great way to kick off the NFL season. Last year’s surprise champs taking on their oldest divisional nemesis – what’s not to love? Like most football fans, I’ve been eagerly looking forward to it all week.

Too bad it’s not too exciting from a fantasy football standpoint. I count four players who should be starters in most formats. Chances are, neither you nor your opponent has any of them. For most of us, it’s almost like the fantasy football season doesn’t really start tonight after all. If you’re chomping at the bit for fantasy action and thinking to yourself, What the heck, let’s see what this Devin Thomas kid can do, snap out of it! Go grab a beer, sit back, and just enjoy some football.

After months and months of waiting, prognosticating, and drafting many a fantasy football team, the day has finally come to get this show on the road! Tonight the defending Superbowl champion New York Giants will host division rivals, the Washington Redskins. Even though they’re the champs, I have a feeling it won’t mean much for New York in this one. It seems that every game in this division is a battle to the end and the G-Men will have to go into this one without their two leading pass rushers from last season in Michael Strahan (retirement) and Osi Umenyiora (injury), while also looking to a young tight end (Kevin Boss) to replace the disgruntled and traded Jeremy Schockey. As a Patriots fan, all I can say is GO REDSKINS! Anyways, enough of the ranting about a game I really don’t care all that much about, and on to some important stuff…like who you should feel confident starting (studs) and who you should think about benching (duds) for this coming week in fantasy football. ARE YOU READY FOR SOME FOOTBALL???

Studs

Marion Barber (RB-DAL): This is Barber’s first chance to prove that he has what it takes to be a feature back, now that Julius Jones has left town, and it couldn’t have come against a better opponent. Last season the Browns gave up nearly 130 yards per game on the ground and that is the kind of production you can expect from Barber in this one (with maybe a touchdown or two). If all goes according to plan, Barber should be one of the top running back plays of the week. (More …)

@Jason: That’s true…and it was one yard shy of his career best apparently. However, he got 25 of the teams 28 rushing attempts, something I see changing a bit in this one with Ahmad Bradshaw helping out. We’ll see though…

@Jason: Yeah looks like my prediction wasn’t so accurate, but it didn’t look like the Giants were in a rush to use Jacobs around the end zone, which could be concerning. The Redskins just looked horrible on offense and I’m glad I own zero of their players on any of my fantasy teams. Jacobs is a bruiser for sure though…he completely destroyed that one defender that tried to bring him down. I wouldn’t expect him to rush for over 6 yards a carry all season long, but you’ll take it if you can get it I guess.